Eli Easton is here today to tell us a little about Lancaster County & she brought some phenomenal pics too!
A Sense of Place: Lancaster County
By Eli Easton
I’m celebrating the release of TENDER MERCIES, the second book in the “Men of Lancaster County” series. It features a new couple and can be read as a stand-alone. What the books in this series have in common is being set in Lancaster County. For this post, I thought I’d share some fun facts and images about Lancaster County to help readers get a sense of place. And while the name “Lancaster County” means something specific to me, I realize it’s not that well-known around the world, so here’s a quickie primer.
Lancaster County is in central Pennsylvania. It’s a heavily rural area with tons of small family farms still in operation (unlike most places in America, where huge factory farms have taken over). It’s best known for the large Amish and Mennonite population, which is one big reason why family farms still flourish here. Lancaster County has beautiful green, rolling countryside with big barns, stone farmhouses, livestock, and crop fields. There are also many small, quaint towns. The photo below was taken on our farm.
Rural setting with buggies and horse drawn plows
We get tons of tourists here through most of the year. What draws people is the feeling of having stepped back in time. When you drive around the country roads here, you can see men plowing the fields with horses or families riding in buggies. The Amish don’t use electricity or cars, and there are tons of Amish in this area (around 70,000), so you frequently see sights like these.
Above: Spotting a buggy from my bike
Also, because the Amish uses horses in everyday life, and keep livestock for milking, there are lots of animals visible as you drive around the area.
Historical Buildings
For the relatively young United States, Lancaster County has a great deal of history. There are quite a few houses and barns still standing from the 1700’s. The farmhouse we live in was built in 1732.
And below are some photos of an old barn I took at a local farm sanctuary.
Seasons
Lancaster County has four seasons including humid summers, gorgeous colors in the fall, snowy winters, and lovely springs. Below is a photo of our barn after a heavy snowfall.
The Men of Lancaster County Series
With the “Men of Lancaster County” series, my goal is to explore the feeling of Lancaster County, a place I love, and specifically to feature romances with Mennonite and Amish characters in the m/m romance genre.
There are a few websites that help support and inform Amish and Mennonite men who come out as gay and leave their community. I myself wasn’t raised in those traditions, but I was the daughter of a very conservative Protestant minister, so I know what it means to be raised in a certain mindset and set of rules that is antithetical to your own mind and heart. I wanted to write about this process, taking a character from his sheltered world and allowing him to discover, and eventually embrace, his true heart.
The first book, A SECOND HARVEST, features a 41-year-old Mennonite farmer, David Fisher, who thinks his life is essentially over. His wife is deceased and his two kids are in college. David lives alone on his farm and sees nothing ahead for himself but endless labor and boredom. That is, until openly gay, city boy Christie Landon moves in next door.
The second book, TENDER MERCIES, features a 19-year-old Amish man, Samuel Miller, who was born with a club foot that went uncorrected. Samuel has always lusted for men, but he’s hid this away, working hard on his father’s farm, and trying not to think about the future. He loses his battle with denial, though, and is caught out by his father, beaten, and shunned. With no place to go, Samuel ends up working for a city man who is trying to start a farm sanctuary in Lancaster County.
I plan to write more in the series. For now I hope you all will take a trip to Lancaster County with me in these first two books. 😊
Fun Facts about Lancaster County:
1. It’s main city, Lancaster, was the nation’s capitol for one day when the Continental Congress met there in 1777.
2. Lancaster’s Central Market is the country’s oldest continuously operating farmer’s market, starting in 1732.
3. Lancaster County was part of the Underground Railroad helping escaping slaves during the Civil War.
4. Lancaster County still has 29 covered bridges.
5. The Amish population of Lancaster County has doubled since 1990. There are approximately 70,000 Amish in Pennsylvania, most of which are in Lancaster County.
6. Roadside stands and on-farm booths are popular with tourists and locals. They sell berries, tomatoes, pumpkins, corn, honey, cider, eggs, preserves, root beer, shoofly pie, and more.
7. Pretzels are a Pennsylvania Dutch tradition. Sturgis Pretzel House in Lancaster County, was founded in 1861.
8. More than 99% of Lancaster farms are family-owned.
9. The tourism trade brings in $1.6 billion a year in Lancaster County.
10.Ranked #1 in the US in preserved farmland with approximately 80,000 acres permanently preserved.
You can learn more about Lancaster County or order a free tourist guide here:
TENDER MERCIES – Eli Easton (Men of Lancaster County #2)
Eddie Graber’s dream of a sanctuary for rescued farm animals was about to come true when his partner backed out at the last minute. Now Eddie risks losing the twenty-five acre property in Lancaster County—and all the hopes he held for it—before the project even gets off the ground. He needs help, he needs money, but most importantly, he needs to rediscover the belief in a higher purpose that brought him here in the first place.
Samuel Miller worked hard to fit into his Amish community despite his club foot. But when his father learns Samuel is gay, he is whipped and shunned. With just a few hundred dollars to his name, Samuel responds to an ad for a farmhand and finds himself employed by a city guy who has strange ideas about animals, no clue how to run his small farm, and a gentle heart.
Samuel isn’t the only lost soul to serendipitously find his way to Meadow Lake Farm. There’s Fred and Ginger, two cows who’d been living in a garage, a gang of sheep, and a little black pig named Benedict who might be the key to life, love, money—and even a happily ever after for two castoffs.
NOTE: This title is set in the same region as book #1 but features a new couple. It can be read as a stand-alone.
Samuel Miller worked hard to fit into his Amish community despite his club foot. But when his father learns Samuel is gay, he is whipped and shunned. With just a few hundred dollars to his name, Samuel responds to an ad for a farmhand and finds himself employed by a city guy who has strange ideas about animals, no clue how to run his small farm, and a gentle heart.
Samuel isn’t the only lost soul to serendipitously find his way to Meadow Lake Farm. There’s Fred and Ginger, two cows who’d been living in a garage, a gang of sheep, and a little black pig named Benedict who might be the key to life, love, money—and even a happily ever after for two castoffs.
NOTE: This title is set in the same region as book #1 but features a new couple. It can be read as a stand-alone.
SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS:
Author Bio for Eli Easton
Having been, at various times and under different names, a minister’s daughter, a computer programmer, a game designer, the author of paranormal mysteries, a fan fiction writer, an organic farmer and a profound sleeper, Eli is happily embarking on yet another incarnation as a m/m romance author.
As an avid reader of such, she is tinkled pink when an author manages to combine literary merit, vast stores of humor, melting hotness and eye-dabbing sweetness into one story. She promises to strive to achieve most of that most of the time. She currently lives on a farm in Pennsylvania with her husband, three bulldogs, three cows and six chickens.
All of them (except for the husband) are female, hence explaining the naked men that have taken up residence in her latest fiction writing.
No comments:
Post a Comment